Exterminate!

The last time I spoke with my friend Joel, he told me how much he and his wife were enjoying the new run of Dr. Who.  Abby and I had watched the first couple of seasons, but we gave up on it mostly because I lost interest.  I liked it, but just let it go.

So... A couple of years after we started and stopped watching, I've decided to revisit Dr. Who, this time starting at the very beginning.  The 1st Doctor - William Hartnell.  Because of the way Netflix presented the discs, I accidentally received the second series (series= a single story arc; distinct from a season) instead of the very first one.  It was a seven episode story introducing to us for the first time one of the Doctor's greatest enemies, the Daleks.  

Relatively long takes, interesting pans and arrangements of figures in the frame, an incredible art design, lots of close-ups of anxious young Susan; I really enjoyed the simple visual delights offered here.

The Thales (sp?) are pretty boring.  The Daleks are as utterly and completely fascinating as they are ridiculous.  

There are a few painfully bad and/or cheesy moments, but most of it holds up really well, not only as good television, but as decent science fiction.

I'm really interested to see how the Doctor is developed as a character as different actors take over.  At first, I thought Hartnell's original take was really silly, but I quickly grew to love his performance.  Now I'm reluctant to see anyone take his place even as I know it must happen.

I don't know if I'll continue this interest in Dr. Who immediately, but I'll keep watching as I can.

I may cancel my Netflix subscription soon!

I really feel the need to watch all of the DVDs that I own.  I've spent way too much money on DVDs that are doing nothing more than sitting on a shelf and I just can't justify the expense of Netflix when I have so many unwatched DVDs at home.  I'm really trying to get through this much too large collection this year.  Not to mention the binder full of recorded TCM broadcasts from my mother that I've barely watched.

Then, I'm hoping to have a great purge and get my collection down to the handful of films that mean the most to me.  Someone please remind me in December that I wrote this back in January.  I hope I can get this done.  We'll see.